The dock was uneasily calm. In the dead of the night there was no sound, no wind, no storm, nor any breath of the tide. The bitter foam cracked and sizzled as it lay idle on the sea top, as the water rolled ominously, back and forth on moor, as if tauntingly beleaguering a person, in order to hide its true intentions.
The gulls floated on the tips of their capacious wings, in large radiated circles, as they prepared to perch upon the many wooden crevasses and covers of the wooden shanty town. From their nestled berths they squealed their vexatious squalls that rung out of over the entire harbor.
Down the ancient stairs clonked and clamored the host of every able bodied man who was ready to risk his all to scan the waters for the lost daughter. In their midst, men carried harpoons and cutlasses, lamps and candles, oars and tillers, nets and rope, crucifixes and rosaries. One could not, from the darkness, tell, if they were a group of fisherman or a rag contention of thieves. In all truth, they were probably both, but they all knew what approached, but nevertheless they came. Lined up for whatever awaited them. Many realized their fate might lead them to the end, to the bottom of Davy Jones' locker, but they were still there, ready and able.
They progressed down the stairs to the lowest level of Stormalong , where they could have access to a beach where long boats were moored. But they could go no farther. At the bottom of the stairs, dressed in fine crimson jackets, slugging on their shoulders the most feared Brown Bess musket, were two of the city's elite guards, a militia of sorts, formed to keep order if there was ever need of it, conscripted and funded from none but the richest citizens. The two guards held fast, bayonets fixed they held their pikes below the final steps of the platform before it let out into the beach.
The running crowd came to a halt forming a crescent around the two armed guards as they ceased clunking down the stairs. Everyone looked strangely at the soldiers who had only been seen, usually, patrolling the rich sector of Stormalong. Indeed, many had never gazed at one so close and were astounded to see the many facets and laces on the soldier's uniforms.
They kept their pikes placed into the midst of the crowd. The one on the left spoke to them firmly and without emotion: "You are not allowed to be here, please leave."
The Captain who levied for the help of the citizens was sorely vexed. "Why, in Gods good earth man, are ye stopping me' from getting' into my own boat? Is it any concern of yours if I risk me' own skin for me kinder."
The younger cadet, on the right, spoke with a sincere tone, "No sir, the Colonel fears for public safety, he wishes all persons to stay confined to their houses, until the storm is done."
" Meine Tochter is out in the storm alone, every moment we delay we endanger her life. Is that not enough?!"
The older sergeant pulled back the lever on his rifle to 'full cock' as he stared grimily at the outspoken Captain.
"Go ahead and shoot!" The captain ripped his shirt revealing his bare chest to the mouth of the gun. "Go ahead! But when you do, you're a dead man. We'll come from all sides, you won't have time."
The soldiers didn't have time to respond, a deep resonance struck so loudly that it shook the entire dock. From the upper furrows of the dock the belfry rang its distress bell. The thunderous chime yelled bloody murder as it rung over and over again to the chorus of yells and screams of those whose lives hung in the balance.
The dock started glowing a fiery red, as the entire Harbor was engulfed in violence. In the midst of the rich district, all of the poorest citizens raped, pillage, and killed everything in sight. Lords and ladies ran everywhere trying to escape the wrath of the gentry who fell upon them like ravenous wolfs. Men cut down servants with tomahawks, brutally slicing their necks opens like paper, and then hacking their bodies to little pieces until there was nothing left but a bloody pulp of flesh and bones left.
Lords were captured, beaten, then strung up by their genitals and pulled until their members were dislocated from their bodies. Servants who had joined the mob, laughed at their former master until they couldn't stand the torture, and then would tie their Masters arms and legs to horses and have it ripped from their bodies.
Ladies were more or less fortunate than the Lords and help. The underlying middle class women were run down and raped right there in the city street by several men all lying on top of the woman. The richer were slaughtered, like their husbands, only their heads were cut off and put on pikes and paraded around. Then it was not uncommon for someone to rape the headless body of the lady. In fact, it was not uncommon for them to be raping the men's either. The most heinous was when the children also shared the parent's fate. This rampage flared up the entire rich district into a wild frenzy as innocents were butchered in the street. People jumped to their deaths from the high deck of Stormalong, into the ice cold, shark infested waters below than to face the reality of what the mob had in store. This cavalcade of debauchery of every type of crime continued until the bell had rung.
Soon though the town guard came, rifles ready at their waist they marched down the streets, one by one, shooting whoever came into sight, quelling with deadly efficiency all that stood in their way. Anyone who was not shot was bayoneted.
As the line progressed, it left in its wake, streets filled with dead bodies and the bodies of those who were dying as they groaned out their last moments, bleeding their hue of blood which soaked into the boards and fell into the harbor below. Soon the shrieks stopped and all that was left was a symphony of moaning and spar gunshots as the entire population of Stormalong was destroyed in one silent night.
A person might speculate that this catastrophe had a start. That something like this doesn't just happen, that maybe the lower classes were abused or wanted to loot. The truth of it was what everyone would never admit. What caused the formally happy and sedated peasants to do this heinous act was simply the fact that they wanted to. They wanted to process what they did not have, so they took the opportunity with the impending storm to overthrow the rich and gain a trifle or two to help them along. But such is what most horrible things in life are caused by, small and petty trifles.
However, the one fact that went unnoticed was that kerosene lamps were still burning right next to the wooden planks…